When we formed our integrated care organisation in October 2015 we became one of the first Trusts in England to join-up hospital, community and adult social care.

As well as running Torbay Hospital, we have five community hospitals, and provide health and social care services to people in their own homes and local communities. We work in partnership with Torbay Council as well as GPs, our colleagues working in adult mental health, children’s services, paramedics, other care providers and wide a range of community and voluntary organisations. Through all our contacts with people, we aim to focus on their wellbeing and what is important to them.

We employ around 6,000 staff including frontline health and social care staff, such as nurses, occupational therapists, social workers, consultants, laboratory staff, physiotherapists as well as our support services teams. They work from a range of different premises across Torbay and south Devon such as health and wellbeing centres, clinics and in people’s own homes. We also have over 800 volunteers who make a difference every day to the people we care for.

Our purpose is to provide safe, high-quality care and social care at the right time and in the right place to support the people of Torbay and South Devon to live their lives to the full.

Newton Abbot Hospital staff (Image: SDHCT)

We have joined this campaign because we recognise the need to invest in our future. The NHS is facing the greatest challenges in its 70-year history, with limited funding and an ageing population who have increasingly complex health and care needs.

We are already investing in staff and services across our area: during 2016/17 we appointed 60 extra intermediate care nurses who work with people in their own homes. As a result, our community teams are now supporting 45 per cent more people at home (or closer to home) who previously would have needed a hospital bed. We also invested £200,000 to employ 12 wellbeing co-ordinators who help connect people with the things that help them to live fulfilling lives.

We want to develop better facilities for health and wellbeing centres in each of our five locality areas, as a ‘go-to’ resource for local people. The services based there will depend on what local communities have said they want, but could include outpatient clinics, pharmacy, GPs, and voluntary services as well as being a base for our local staff teams.

Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust

When people need specialist hospital care, we want them to have access to safe, high-quality care in facilities that are modern and fit for purpose. In February 2017, we opened a state-of-the-art, £15m new intensive care unit and main entrance at Torbay Hospital. However, we have so much more to do, and our biggest funding challenges are the state of our buildings and our IT infrastructure.

At Torbay Hospital we see around 78,000 people a year in our Emergency Department (ED). Our staff do a fantastic job, but they’re working in cramped facilities and, when it’s very busy, we know that conditions can be less than ideal. We want to offer our patients the very best services in the best possible environment, so we are now campaigning for investment to redevelop our ED. Our aim is to see and treat people in a setting that is designed to support modern healthcare.

Torbay Hospital

We believe that IT is critical in enabling us to work differently and more efficiently in future. We already run a number of tele-healthcare projects and know that people now often turn first to their phones when they need advice. We developed a new app, NHSquicker, to help people find the most appropriate, quickest and nearest place when they need urgent help from the NHS.

Our community staff need to be able to link seamlessly with their GP and hospital colleagues. The technology already exists to support us with this, and it requires significant investment. We will need to bid against national funds to really make a difference.

Our vision for health and care services is that local people are well informed about how to keep healthy, are able to make decisions that support them to live well and have good access to high-quality health and care support when they need it. Their needs might be met by a volunteer or a charity worker, a neighbour or a nurse, a doctor or a social worker: whoever it is, we will guide them to the right support, in the right place, at the right time. We will all be working together as a single, co-ordinated team to provide excellent services for the people of Torbay and South Devon.